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Awareness of Social Perceptions

R

Rasputin

ASD / Aspie
V.I.P Member
I am on a roll today posting. Anyway, a friend who goes to my church told me today that she thought I had ASD all alone, before I was diagnosed, and she was surprised that I did not know I had ASD. Then I was thinking about work, where last year I was identified as having ASD. I was even invited to a charity fundraiser for ASD, which I attended. The good thing is companies are starting to actively recruit neurodiverse employees.

I am wondering if people have assumed I had ASD for years, and I was just socially unaware. Is this possible?
 
Yes I wondered that about myself at least in relation to some of the therapy I have done, I can think of an NHS psychiatric nurse who was also a private therapist who I did some groupwork with, and in retrospect wonder if he recognised how I was as being on the autistic spectrum. I wish he had said, if so.

Mostly I doubt it, as most people don't know much about autism, it's only recently becoming more generally understood or recognised. Probably males who somewhat fit some of the more typical ideas about autism are more likely to have been labelled by others but not necessarily accurately. You work in IT and have some of the traits that are relatively typical, I guess?

I'm gay, and I think that I am most likely to be labelled as gay, because I kind of look gay, I mean I fit a stereotype in that area. It happens to apply in my case. When I came out as gay my sister said she'd thought I probably was since observing me with my best friend at school about 20 years earlier. On reflection I realised, oops yes I probably was in love with her... who knew?

Probably only people well informed about ASD and who know me well would think I may be on the spectrum. And there's only about 3 people in the intersection of those two categories.
 
Nobody but doctors have pinpointed ASD in my life. However, I realized before my adult diagnosis while watching my son spin a Flower around thinking "That's a sure sign of ASD" then I looked down at my own hand and I was doing the same thing with a pebble. That was a breakthrough moment for me.
 
Rasputin said:
I am wondering if people have assumed I had ASD for years, and I was just socially unaware. Is this possible?
Click to expand...

Have you received a formal ASD diagnosis? People who get the diagnosis later in life treat it like the answer they've been waiting for all their lives.
 
Peter Jansen said:
Have you received a formal ASD diagnosis? People who get the diagnosis later in life treat it like the answer they've been waiting for all their lives.
Click to expand...

Yes, ASD actually. I was diagnosed January 30th at age 61. I do have a sense of fitting in with this group that I never had before.
 
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Thinx said:
Yes I wondered that about myself at least in relation to some of the therapy I have done, I can think of an NHS psychiatric nurse who was also a private therapist who I did some groupwork with, and in retrospect wonder if he recognised how I was as being on the autistic spectrum. I wish he had said, if so.

Mostly I doubt it, as most people don't know much about autism, it's only recently becoming more generally understood or recognised. Probably males who somewhat fit some of the more typical ideas about autism are more likely to have been labelled by others but not necessarily accurately. You work in IT and have some of the traits that are relatively typical, I guess?

I'm gay, and I think that I am most likely to be labelled as gay, because I kind of look gay, I mean I fit a stereotype in that area. It happens to apply in my case. When I came out as gay my sister said she'd thought I probably was since observing me with my best friend at school about 20 years earlier. On reflection I realised, oops yes I probably was in love with her... who knew?

Probably only people well informed about ASD and who know me well would think I may be on the spectrum. And there's only about 3 people in the intersection of those two categories.
Click to expand...

The lady at my church who thought I had ASD does I'm fact work with children who have ASD as a special needs teacher. So she would be more likely to know. It just surprised me, since I first seriously considered it myself only a year ago. Also, a lady where I work identified the ASD because her 16 year old son has ASD. Until then I just thought I was eccentric.
 
Rasputin said:
The lady at my church who thought I had ASD does I'm fact work with children who have ASD as a special needs teacher. So she would be more likely to know. It just surprised me, since I first seriously considered it myself only a year ago. Also, a lady where I work identified the ASD because her 16 year old son has ASD. Until then I just thought I was eccentric.
Click to expand...
I was diagnosed at age 60. A job search counselor suggested I had ASD and set up an evaluation. This was after a lifetime of suffering and loneliness knowing I was different and having nobody to talk to about it, or even being able to express it to myself. This despite more than twenty years of seeing psychiatrists, psychologists, and mental health therapists and counselors who are allegedly professionals trained to spot these things.
 
Shamar said:
I was diagnosed at age 60. A job search counselor suggested I had ASD and set up an evaluation. This was after a lifetime of suffering and loneliness knowing I was different and having nobody to talk to about it, or even being able to express it to myself. This despite more than twenty years of seeing psychiatrists, psychologists, and mental health therapists and counselors who are allegedly professionals trained to spot these things.
Click to expand...

At first I wasn't sure about my diagnosis, because no doctor had ever suggested that I had ASD. But everything is making sense now for me.

I hope you are coping better now.
 
I once asked a friend, "Do I seem autistic to you?"

He answered, "Aren't you?"

And I answered :eek:.
 
My sister is a nurse and when I told her she said yeah I pretty much knew that but you would have flipped at me if I'd suggested it.

She wasn't wrong I'd never have accepted it, came to it myself after my son got diagnosed.
Dont thinks it odd at all to be the last to know.
 
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